


Notice

by BurningTea



Series: Lethal Weapon [1]
Category: Lethal Weapon (TV)
Genre: Coda, Gen, S1E5, Spilt Milk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-22
Updated: 2016-10-22
Packaged: 2018-08-24 01:49:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 620
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8351581
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BurningTea/pseuds/BurningTea
Summary: Riggs is getting to be a master at pretending he doesn't notice things about himself.





	

**Author's Note:**

> A short drabble. I have vague thoughts of doing more on this theme, but we'll see.

Riggs doesn’t want to talk. He let slip about the fear, about the parachute feeling of danger in throwing himself into something most people wouldn’t even consider. She’s going to bring it up at some point, he just knows it. 

So he retreats to the roof, sits on the edge to remind himself tipping over is always an option, cracks open a beer, and waits for the parts of his mind this case has riled up to settle. Sometimes, if he’s very lucky, he can quiet things down enough he almost doesn’t feel anything. 

This time, he’s not so lucky. 

By the time Murtaugh finds him, Riggs is reliving times he’s lost brothers, times when he hasn’t managed to save them. It takes more effort than it usually does to crack a smile. But it has to be done: his partner’s already seen too many of the cracks in his heart. When Riggs is really drunk, or it’s really far into the depths of yet another mostly sleepless night, he thinks there are cracks in his soul. Right now he’s mostly sober and it’s daylight, and he doesn’t quite believe in things like souls. 

He does believe in deflecting anything that gets too close to the layer he’s papered over the cracks, so he pretends not to hear the honest offer Murtaugh makes and instead turns it to a joke. 

Maybe Miranda is still watching over him, though, to be sending this man into his life. 

“You really going to sit with your back to the drop?” he asks, sometime around the third beer. Roger’s still nursing his first one. “You not afraid you might…” He whistles, a descending note, and mimes a falling motion with his right hand. “No? Me, I prefer to see the fall. But whatever lets you sleep.”

“Like I’d be sleeping with you right on the edge like that,” Roger says, and shifts the way he does when he wants to ask about it, when pretending he doesn’t see the pain is too much for him. 

Riggs almost always pretends he doesn’t notice it. Pretending he doesn’t notice things is a key part of his strategy. 

“I’ll be just fine, you want to go home to your wife and kids. Don’t stick around on my account,” Riggs tells him. “I’m just going to sit here and drink. I don’t need watching.”

He knows that’s a lie. He doesn’t want to need watching. He doesn’t want anyone to see him finally break. 

“Well, now, no…no,” Roger says, and this time when he moves it’s to wriggle as though he’s getting more comfortable on a sofa. “I didn’t say I wanted to go home. Why’d I want to go home, to my beautiful house and my even more beautiful kids and my most beautiful of all wife? That’s just crazy talk. I’d much rather sit here on a wall, a giant murderous drop behind me, and drink this delightful beer with my totally stable partner. Are you kidding me? Saying I might want to go home. It’s like you don’t know me, that’s what it is.”

“Right,” Riggs says. “Right. I forgot.” He turns enough to see Roger properly and his inclines his head towards him. “You hate being all comfortable at home. All about the danger. That’s you.”

“Hell, yes,” Roger says. “The danger and the hard wall and the view of a roof. Who wouldn’t want this?”

They fall into silence for a while, but when Riggs finally gives in and says the bar is closing, he lets Roger take his hand to pull him up from the wall. This time, he thinks it’s Roger who pretends not to notice Riggs’ eyes are damp.


End file.
